When you spend three weeks every year for 28 years at Wimbledon and become known as "the Voice of Wimbledon", you get to know the roads, the hotels, the restaurants and the people.

But while knows his way around the grounds at the All-England Club and certainly knows the broadcast compound, he did something this year he has never done before ... sit in the Royal Box.

"Dick was sort of the friendly voice of Wimbledon for all the Americans," said Australian great Rod Laver, a four-time winner at Wimbledon and now a San Diego resident.

"And he knows the game.

"I always thought he did a good job with his bloody commentary. He would always tell an honest story when looking at the game.

"He tried to get to know the players and that goes way back with the Newcombes, Borgs and that group. He was involved with them and stayed close to the game.

"Dick was great for the game. To him, it wasn't a job because he really enjoyed the game.

"Sitting in the Royal Box, I know, is a big thrill for him. There is always royalty there.

"For him to get in the Royal Box, that is his jewel."

Enberg had to give up Wimbledon when he took over as voice of the Padres on TV four years ago.

He missed the recent homestand with the Dodgers and Phillies to fly to England, and will miss the four-game series in Miami that starts Friday.

Enberg will return for the Padres-Red Sox series in Boston.

More Padres

Mike Pomeranz and Mark Grant will work the Padres' four-game series with the Marlins on Fox Sports San Diego with Kelly Crull on the sidelines.

Enberg returns for the series with the Red Sox in Boston, which includes a 10:35 a.m. game on July 4. Mark Sweeney joins Grant and Enberg in the booth for that series.

Enberg and Grant will work the three-game series with the Nationals.

Andy Ashby, one of the stars of the 1998 Padres World Series team and a genuine good guy, will work eight games in the studio, starting Saturday.

Prep football

The National Federation of State High School Associations (NFHS) and Playon! Sports plan to create and launch the NFHS Network, an all-digital network devoted to high school sports across the nation.

The NFHS hopes to launch in time for the start of the 2013-14 school year with a subscription-based digital service available at NFHSnetwork.com.

John Labeta, assistant commissioner of the San Diego Section said the network was a topic of discussion at the recent state-wide commissioners meeting.

One of the road blocks is that Time Warner has contracts to carry prep sports in California, so a deal would have to be worked out between TW and PlayOn! Sports.

With 19,000 high schools in the U.S. and nearly two million events annually, Bob Gardner, executive director of the NFHS said finding programming shouldn't be a problem.

"Details need to be worked out, but this could happen," Labeta said.

ESPNU will have three days of prep football coverage from Oregon, starting Monday at 4 p.m. Coverage includes Sparq events that features 163 of the nationals top players. Former Torrey Pines High and Palomar College quarterback Tom Luginbill provides commentary from the event.

Ratings game

Game 6 of the Stanley Cup Finals between the Chicago Blackhawks and Boston Bruins did a 5.6 rating on NBC, up 40 percent from the L.A. Kings Cup clincher last season over the New Jersey Devils. Game 5 Saturday on NBC did a 4.0 rating, up 54 percent from last season.

Easy to see what wheel sport is No. 1 in the U.S. Sunday's NASCAR race on TNT did a 3.0 rating with 2.3-million households. Sunday's IndyCar race did a dismal 0.7 rating with 544,000 households on ABC.

No Tiger. No Phil. No problem for CBS, which did a 2.1 rating with 1.6-million households for Sunday's final round of the PGA Tour's Travelers Championship. That's up 17 percent from last year.

Tuesday's College World Series final between UCLA and Mississippi State did a 1.3 rating on ESPN, down 37 percent from Arizona-South Carolina last season.

The first 12 matches of the FIFA Confederations Cup matches on ESPN and ESPN2 averaged 485,000 viewers. As bad as that sounds, the numbers are up 21 percent from 2009. Saturday's Italy-Brazil match averaged 933,000 viewers. San Diego and Los Angeles are among the top-10 markets.

Around the dial

Veteran college football analyst Kirk Herbstreit signed a contract extension that will keep him at ESPN through 2022.

The MLB Network has three games live on July 4 - Brewers-Nationals at 8 a.m., Orioles-White Sox at 11 a.m. and Dodgers-Rockies at 5 p.m.

Wimbledon action continues Friday and Saturday on ESPN with Sunday a scheduled day off. The Round of starts Monday with the women's semifinals July 4.

The FIFA Confederations Cup continues this weekend with the third-place game at 11:45 a.m. Saturday on ESPN2. The finals are set for 2:30 p.m. Saturday on ESPN.